A different build... "TK421 why aren't you at your post?" Documenting my build for the Empire!

Big weekend has come and gone, today is a vacation day.  On Revenge of the Fifth, the Empire recoups.

Friday after work I went to a local high school that had an art festival.  Decided to go ISB officer, save the 'trooper for Saturday & it's relevant now with Andor.  We were very concerned about rain but it was good until the last 30min.  We stayed under that pop up for a bit and the principal thanked us for being there, and said everyone was wrapping up anyway.

They had a costume contest & asked us to judge.  He shoved the microphone in my hand and I was like uh, ok.  The Tusken Raider got this photo and made me into a meme.

Saturday early, I did a troop at my favorite local vintage toy store.  I know the owner now & we had talked about it for years, but the local LEGO Brick store kinda stole his thunder & the tunr-out wasn't as big as he had hoped.  The rain didn't help I'm sure, but he still had a decent number of customers.  Plus we caught people going into/leaving Ollie's next door so that was fun.  I also talked everyone into walking down to the local hobby shop in the plaza, that was fun!  They geeked out over us.

The next stop was the Plaza Theatre in Miamisburg, showing A New Hope Saturday.  With the cold and rain, and small dressing area up narrow stairs, I decided to switch to the scanning crew.  I left the undersuit on for warmth and dressed at home, no dressing room needed!  With a few last-minute signups we had about 8-10 people, decent turnout.  The owner of the theater loves us and let us pass the bucket to raise $ for charity.

Some of us decided to go to dinner afterwards (I had eaten around 3pm in-between events when I let my dog out and was getting hungry).

So Dennis and I went to dinner in costume. 

Sunday at noon we did the theater again, this time showing Empire Strikes Back.  With the cooler temps I said I don't care about the small room or stairs, I'm bringing the snowtrooper.  It was perfect, around 52F and overcast.  I had a white GRM long sleeve underneath just in case but probably didn't need it. 

Katie wore her Hoth Leia so I said I need a photo while we're both here in appropriate costumes.  A What If version of ESB?

We raised a bit over $700 between the two days at the theater, just passing a costume helmet around the audience both days, for Make A Wish.  Not bad.

After the event Sunday I went to the ice cream shop across the street that was doing the Fanta-m Menace again, orange Fanta with vanilla Gelato.  So good.  Then I went home and watched Revenge of the Sith and lounged with the cats and dog.  Whew.

Wednesday night was Star Wars night at the FC Cincinnati soccer game.  I left early and headed down to the stadium, but first we had to deal with parking garages and shuttles because there is zero parking around the TQL Stadium.  I was a bit concerned with timing, traffic, and needing to hit the Hair and Makeup department (girlfriend) for the white hair dye.  But in the end, it all worked out.

The mascot had a light saber and challenged me to a duel.  I managed to win without getting my hands cut off.  I didn't realize how big the crowd was until I saw photos from both sides!  That poor guy/girl was sweating something fierce, every time my hand touched the fur it was soaking wet on the outside!  But we had fun, gave each other a thumbs-up afterwards, and they joined us for photos for awhile.

Made for a long day/night getting home around 11pm.  Oof.

Yesterday was the annual Dayton Pride parade and festival.  The weather was pretty decent for almost-summer in Ohio so I opted for the stormtrooper again.  It ended up a bit warmer by the end than last year but could have been worse.  That's the newest mouse droid from Disney that everyone went crazy for (they sold out too fast for me to even attempt).  It's huge, but lightweight, and it survived the whole parade.

I decorated the costume much like last year but made a few changes.  The tape really works well, and I had some rainbow vinyl this year that I made some simple designs like the stripe on the helmet, the drop-boxes on the belt, and something on the thermal detonator on the back.

No one took any photos of us actually walking in the parade.  There was a Facebook event that I followed, and last night I saw someone post a photo of their booth.  I posted a group photo and asked if anyone had any photos of us in the parade.  This morning I'm up to like 20 photos!  Not surprised, we posed for many and I saw a lot on the walk.

I've decided that next year I'm going to wear my simple scanning crew costume and bring Monster Mouse, my 4x4 mouse droid.  I'm going to decorate him with rainbows and all the big gay bear stuff I can think of. 

Friday I took a half-day to help with Kettering Pride festival.  I got there around 1pm and the booth was already mostly set up, so I just hung around until the festival started at 2pm.  Even that early we had a decent crowd, for a weekday especially.  The rain was a factor, we kept watching the radar & it sprinkled off and on, but that didn't stop the crowd.

My GF got there around 5pm and grabbed some food truck food (Lumpia Queen), so I hit a Puerto Rican food truck (berkeleying amazing), and decided berkeley the rain, I'm changing into the costume.  Shortly after it stopped raining anyway, and I stayed until about 730pm, it ended at 8pm.  Helped tear down and then the long walk back to my car with the bin, another troop down.

Friday will be the parade in Centerville, driving the Crosstrek again.  Need to check the flashing lights on the grill and wash it, hopefully remember the 501st magnets for the doors.

But then Sunday is the Weird Al concert!  It took awhile, but we did get official notice a few weeks ago to get set up.  They asked for 10 stormtroopers and Vader, which in 2019 we had a hard time finding 8 (ended up with 6 plus two other characters).  Once again, we have 4 troopers plus some other characters they allowed (has to be an even number).

New people got preference, and since I'm one of the two leaders in the area, I'm automatically a handler, which is what I really wanted anyway.  I had my fun, I want to be a bit more relaxed this time.  BUT I'm taking the costume just in case, one guy is notorious for either dropping out last minute or lately "forgetting" a piece and just hanging out.  If he berkeleys us over, that means someone else gets berkeleyed (again, even numbers on stage).

Warm parade today, not feeling very jovial lately but it's a troop.  I got to see some friends, and the crowds loved us as always.  Since I was driving I didn't even feel like a costume, just wore the officer's hat.  All the crowd could really see anyway.

Day after tomorrow is the big one, Weird Al.  One of the stormtroopers was in the parade today, he has a really old kit, he was bragging that it's 20+ years old and it looks it.  I leant him a big safety pin right off the bat because something was broken.  Every time I looked in the mirror, something else was falling apart.  I really hope he gets his E36 M3 together by Sunday or I might get called into this after all.

Boy, what a day/night that was...

Sunday was Weird Al in concert!  We left my house at about 230pm and got home around midnight. 95% of that was spent outside, or inside a loading dock at Fraze Pavilion.

This time I opted to be a handler for the event, and help keep everything running smoothly. Costume fixes, keeping everyone hydrated, chasing down the assorted managers for questions and making sure we were where we needed to be and when. I knew a bit about what was going to happen, so I helped out with the routine practice, that was different for me. Jenn helped as one of the photographers. The guys and gals hit the stage finally around 1030pm for two songs, and as before the crowd went crazy.

Weird Al is always a great guy, the managers I dealt with were super friendly, and I believe everything went great including the VIP photos afterwards (which I'm still checking the account to see when they pop up.) We got some autographed stuff as well.

If you want to see the Ohio Garrison later this year, there are dates in September for Columbus, Cleveland, and Newport (listed as Cincinnati on the shirt I bought.)

Just before the show started, a cameraman came out to the backstage area we were hanging out in & said they were going to be doing the intro soon.  I thought he was chasing us away.  Instead, he asked us if we wanted to help.

Weird Al starts the show from his dressing room, and a camera follows him, backwards, while he makes his way around all the equipment & walkways, weaving through stuff, while singing "Tacky".  They wanted a few of us to hang out along his path, with our helmets on.  I had brought my costume as a backup, so I had my helmet with me.  That's me hanging out at the bottom of some steps next to a trailer (the trailer next to it was our dressing room again).

Happy 7 year anniversary of this thread.  From the details of how I've built the stormtrooper (and then other costumes), to my adventures at various "troops".  Hopefully some of you have been entertained!  (And this weekend will make my 200th troop at Gem City Comicon.)

Gem City ComiCon was last weekend.  I only attended Sunday, spent Saturday doing a few other things.  It was moved to a Hilton near UD this year, from what I understand the Dayton Convention Center was getting expensive and they wanted to keep the focus on comics & affordable family fun.  I think admission was $5?

There was more room than I expected, more vendors than I expected, and except for it being a bit warm in our hallway I had no complaints.  We had decent foot traffic and still had plenty of members sign up (~20 Saturday and ~12 Sunday).  I celebrated my 200th 501st Legion troop with "Big Shrimp Energy" food truck food - a decent shrimp boil with potatoes.

Yesterday afternoon was another hospital visit!  Cincinnati Children's West Liberty Campus near my work had a mid-day event for families.  A few other groups were invited and we all got to play together, we've met a few of them at other events like festivals and cons.  Thankfully it was all indoors this time, no outside patio like a couple years ago.

At one point they said they wanted to take 3-4 of us from the front lobby upstairs to wander a bit, my back was getting sore so I said let's go.  We hit floors 2 and 3 to find more people in the hallways, waiting areas and staff desks.  After about an hour we went back down to the main floor.

A lady with therapy dogs had been trying to get a photo of her dog in front of us.  At one point she held out the leash and asked if anyone wanted to hold the dog.  I thought she meant hold the LEASH, until she picked the dog up and started putting him in my hands.  I was like make sure my hands are situated well, I can't really see!  He put up with me for a few photos but he was obviously having a hecking concern!

Simple troop after Cars and Coffee yesterday.  Kids Optimist Day at Delco Park in Kettering.  I like doing this one, fairly short, local and lots of free stuff for kids to do.  The weather seemed to make it even busier, I gave out a pocket's full of trading cards, reloaded, and ran out again before we left.  Kind of a bummer we couldn't get more troopers but it is what it is.

Yesterday was the Holiday at Home parade in Kettering, I think I've done it every year since 2018 except 2020 when it was canceled.

Once again I drove the Crosstrek, we had a smaller crowd.  Four of my usual suspects had left for a 2 week cruise on Saturday, but I still rounded up 7-8 others including my GF that rode in the back in her jawa costume waving at the crowd.  But the star of the show was the KY member that came up with that battery powered speeder bike, and ran up and down the parade route in his biker scout costume.  I love that thing.

Dude.  That speeder bike is AWESOME!

Love what you're doin, man.  Keep up the amazing work!

Youtube video of the parade and the speeder bike.

Can you still embed YT videos here?

Jerry said:

Youtube video of the parade and the speeder bike.

Can you still embed YT videos here?

You can.  I use the document with the plus button just to the left of the photo upload button.  Copy and paste the URL and it works.

Problem is, adding text AFTER you do so always gets glitchy so I try to have everything written THEN embed.

They never get our message right.  We have a Veteran's Day parade coming up in Dayton at the VA, I sent the info and printed "FIVE OH FIRST LEGION" in capital letters.

Yesterday was the WACO Fly-In in Troy OH & our 3rd year doing this event.  It was warm but not as bad as last year, I was hoping that recent bit of cooler weather would hold out.  WOMP womp.

We had 6-7 members this time, still only managed one pilot.  I made sure I got a few photos of him around the field, you get right up close and personal with the planes, and can stand at the edge of their "runway" when they take off/land.  This year I wore my scanning crew costume and brought Monster Mouse the off-road mouse droid.

I'm glad I did, quite a few kids were interested in him.  I managed to only roll him over once!  I've gotten good at being able to save it when it's tipping, usually throttle and/or turning, maybe quick reverse.  If only my car skills were that good.

E36 M3, I forgot yesterday was my 7 year anniversary of joining the 501st Legion.  

Last week we finally had another hospital visit!  I've been working hard to try to get them back since 2023, and at a time when more people could do it.  Someone in the Mando group had a girlfriend on the inside, but she kept scheduling for like 2pm on a weekday.  Most of us are doing the 9-5 thing, even the retirees only signed up a couple times.  We canceled at least one event for no sign-ups, I took a vacation day for one.

But in July I finally found someone that was willing to set up visits around 530pm, and that was good enough for me!  I think it's going to be a regular thing again, hoping every other month.  We had a wait list for this like we used to, they limited it to 5 characters.  We ended up going from 530pm to a bit after 8pm!  At least 4 floors, many rooms and a trip through the ER.  The contact had a big cart of Star Wars toys and puzzles, that was pretty cool.

It took me until today to get the photo.  I had given him my phone to try to get a few with staff at least, if not kids.  He said he would, then ended up using his phone the whole night.  I won't do that again!

Yesterday was Rocket Day at the Air Force Museum in Dayton.  I had a busy day planned & it seemed like we were short on helpers, so I was a handler for this one.  We ended up with fewer people than I expected, and two other handlers, kinda wish I had costumed and brought a mouse droid.

But our KY friend brought Chopper and a recent transfer from TX brought his BT-1 droid that I REALLY liked.  He has all kinds of accessories and moving bits, my favorite was two pinchers that pop out on either side in front.  Palpatine is my lady friend Katie & she was sweating something fierce in that rubber mask.  The TIE pilot is my good friend Brian and I was happy he made it.  He had to skip the WACO event because he recently got sick, gallstones, gallbladder removed and pancreatitis on top of that.  All days before a two week European cruise he and his wife were supposed to attend with 3 other Star Wars friends.

Next week starts the Halloween events and I plan to be busy.

Yesterday was a very warm Huber Haunts at the Rose Music Center this year, vs a park.  They've gotten bigger every year and this year the place was packed the entire 11-2pm.  We almost ran out of candy, while I thought we had plenty for 2-3 events.  A few thousand pieces and only a half bag of Dum Dums were left.

I caught a cold at last week's event and was still feeling less than perfect, but the morning of the event I decided berkeley it go all in with the stormtrooper.  I just wadded up some toilet paper and had to take a break a bit more often.  This year we decided to do a booth vs walking, and we never left.  Did I mention it was packed?  They said over 5K last year and this was definitely more, they were guessing well into the upper thousands.  But it was fun, 99% were well behaved kids and parents, and of course some parents shyly asked for their own photos.  I'm like, hell I would want a photo myself!

One of my favorite events Saturday night, Ghostly Night Out in Brookville OH.  One of our members lives nearby & always puts together a great pot luck dinner.  Plus plenty of time to chat with friends before we head out.  I decided to be a handler again this year so I could get good photos for PR, now for the 501st Legion and I've started helping with the Rebel Legion local group (basically same people but wearing good guy costumes).

Didn't get quite as many this year, we ended a bit earlier when the "wow factor" seemed to have ended.  But I got some decent ones, including various members at the fire pit again.

Next week would have been the annual event at the Air Force Museum, but yesterday they canceled it because of the government shutdown.  I think my next might be Veteran's Day parade, maybe a hospital visit if I can get the contact to reply.

Thursday after work was a trunk or treat at a local park, like 3 miles from my house.  So I left work early & helped out, especially since the Air Force museum event got canceled.  The rain stopped about an hour before the event, which was nice, but the temps were in the 40s and a bit of wind at first.  I bundled up under my flightsuit (behind Kelly dumping out candy), even a hoodie that barely fit underneath.  I felt like the Stay-Puft Marshmellow man.

But even with the cold and earlier rain, the kids were non-stop from about 20min early right up until it ended at 8pm.  We had two Star Wars Jeeps on either side, and lots of candy.  99% of the kids were very well behaved, one even apologized when we said 1 each and he started to take a handful.  I'll do this one again if it happens next year, I think it was a new event.